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[Moe]

This may already be possible, but I couldn't figure it out.  It's a bit confusing to explain, I will do my best.

Using the ListItem function I am separating actors out so that their name is selectable in Theaterview. 

This is how I did it.  I start with the [Actors] field which has a value of

Mel Gibson
Catherine McCormack
Sophie Marceau
Patrick McGoohan
Angus Macfadyen
Brendan Gleeson
James Robinson
etc. etc.

Then I have five new fields with the following values

ListItem([Actors],0)
ListItem([Actors],1)
ListItem([Actors],2)
ListItem([Actors],3)
ListItem([Actors],4)

Here is an example of what the above returns



You'll notice that  Catherine McCormack's name is selected.  Right now, when I click on it, nothing happens.  If I click on Mel Gibson it will return some results, but it will only return movies where Mel Gibson is the first actor listed in the [Actors] field.

What I'd like to happen is have MC search for the selected person's name in any list field and in any position within the list.  Basically, I want to replicate the search functionality in standard view.

An even better solution would be for MC to parse a list automatically in Theaterview.  Making each list item selectable when displaying a list field so we wouldn't have to create a new field for every actor like I have done above (this is probably a pipe dream but it doesn't hurt to ask).

[Moe]

Any chance of something like this happening?  It would add such a cool new way to browse movies.

[JimH]

Could you bump this next week?  Matt's out this week.

[Moe]

Definitely, thanks Jim.

[Moe]

Bump for Matt's return.

[Matt]

I think this is kind of a tricky one.

You have a field defined like this:
ListItem([Actors],0)

So how would Media Center know to evaluate the search to something like [Actors]=[Mel Gibson]?

Thanks for any tips.

[Moe]

Assuming I am understanding your question, It works in standard view

[Matt]

I created Actor 1, Actor 2, etc. fields.

Then when I pick one of the actors in Theater View from that field, the search correctly looks at the actor.

So I might need a little more help.

Thanks.

[Moe]

Does it find that actor if they are not listed first in the Actors list field?

For example, if I click Mel Gibson, it will find some of his movies, but only when he is the first person listed in the Actors list field

[Matt]

Well that's to be expected since it's searching on the "Actor 1" field.

It sort of has to search on that field since that's what was clicked.

Let me know if you can think of a way around that.

[Moe]

Oh, yeah, duh. Not sure how I missed that one. 

The complicated solution would be what I posted in my original post "An even better solution would be for MC to parse a list automatically in Theaterview.  Making each list item selectable when displaying a list field so we wouldn't have to create a new field for every actor like I have done above (this is probably a pipe dream but it doesn't hurt to ask)."

Is that at all feasible?

Or make it search for that persons name in any field?

[lepa]

Why not "enter" kind of child mode when selecting list type field? So when I would press enter when list field is selected I would then be able to cycle through members of the list with up and down arrows. Pressing enter would search selected list element in contex of original field (actor in this case). left arrow would be back button from cycling. It would be clean from user perspective and no need to do userhacks with listitem function. Of course it would require some implementation but would help with other list fields like composer and such also.

[Moe]

Yes, that's what I was trying to articulate when I said "An even better solution would be for MC to parse a list automatically in Theaterview.  Making each list item selectable when displaying a list field so we wouldn't have to create a new field for every actor like I have done above"  You did so much more eloquently than I did

[lepa]

So something like this... sorry for crappy picture 

[Moe]

Yep, that's exactly what I imagine.

[tyler69]

Interesting problem. I hope that I understand correctly, but wouldn't filling the values of "Actor" with a comma separated list (of actors) work?
I kind of had a comparable issue I think: I tried to create a view (not theater view related) based on artists so that when I'd click on an artist name, MC would show me all music in which the "Artist" tag contains that name (also when maintained in a comma separated list, e.g. "Jan Garbarek, Manu Katche"). It supposedly is possible, but I never managed to get it to work. So maybe this is an idea for your use case? Pretty similar to lepa's good child-idea.
However, I suppose the Theater View UI would need to be adapted, in a way that the "fields" on the UI will not be mapped to the several fields you created, but the "Artist" values (separated by commas).

[Moe]

Actors is already a semicolon delimited list. 

[Hendrik]

I think making Theater View render list-type fields actually individually selectable should be possible. We render the field special already where every entry gets onto its own line, just need to also make it selectable to trigger the search. Searching over the entire list (ie. as it is today) is pointless anyway.

Matt, you got this, right?

[lepa]

I think that Matt got this 

[Moe]

If he doesn't, can we trust that you'll give him another punt?

[Matt]

If he doesn't can we trust that you'll give him another punt?

I'm still recovering from my last punt!

[Moe]

Any chance of this happening?  You all seemed to think it was a good idea. 

Should I go and get your punting shoes Hendrik?

[lepa]

This would be nice

[arcspin]

I have entered the rabbit hole of trying to customize the Theater view and File info panel as good as I understand with the good help of moe, leepa and others and this is yet another dead end where I find my self stuck with no solution in sight.
The ability to link and then search individual actors, screen writers, directors, producers and so on needs to be a thing that you can do in JRiver from the File info panel.
This is not something that a few users of JRiver wants this is a a basic functionality that needs to be implemented preferably even with expression code so that I can have names sorted and presented they way I like it.

I find it frustrating that I invest hours and hours on weekends and evenings trying to get JRiver the basic functionality that it should have and still bump into brick walls like this one.




Keeping my hopes up that the good people of MC are on the case,

//arcspin

[AlanDistro]

Bumping this as I was also trying to do this a few days ago and was surprised you couldn't. Plex has this for Actors and Directors and it's a great tool for searching related titles.

[RoderickGI]

Could we have another look at this functionality? It seemed like there was a path to a solution a few posts back.

I would actually use this solution quite a lot, and not just on the [Actors] field, but on [Genre], [Director], and [Producer], and that is just for video (TV & Movies). I would use it for Audio as well, so if the solution could be universal for all List type fields, that would be great.

The use case is fairly obvious. Watch a show or movie, want to see more of a particular Actor/Director/Producer's work, select the value in the list, a view of all their works is shown. Same for Genre, watched an Action movie, want to see similar, select from the list, there you are.

Of course, all that can be done using separate Views, as now, but that requires typing and searching, while this solution would be just point and shoot.

[wer]

Yes, agreed.  I'd also like this.

In my view, this already works well for Genre, Director, Producer, and Year, because all those usually have a single entry.  You can do what I call a "pivot search" on any one of those fields easily from Theater View.

It's really only Actors that's the problem, because that is always a list with multiple items.

The list of films containing an actor can be enumerated with the expression:
[Actors]&datatype=[ list ]

But the issue is that returns a list of ALL actors.  What we're looking for is the results that you get from that list, but keyed into just the actor that is selected from the list in theater view.

So the real search would be [Actors]=[variable]
where variable is whatever is selected from the list.  A dynamic expression, instead of static.

[lepa]

bump. Any chance for this one?